2107 Indoor Barebow Championship - Part 1

The mother of all Barebow tournaments in Southeast Asia...

Shortly after the 2017 UPM indoor open archery tournament, Michelle and I have been mulling the idea of heading up to Bangkok to compete at the Indoor Barebow Championship. It's actually a side-event organized concurrently with stage 2 of the 2017  Indoor Archery World Cup.
We gave it much thought and decided that it was an event not to be missed. The fees in Singapore Dollars is considered as very expensive. We paid SG$200 per entry and at SG$400 (RM1,205), shooting at such an event is simply no child's play.
Prior to this, I have been told by an experienced archer from Singapore that the minimum score per round to qualify for the elimination rounds was at 240/300. So, having heard that, I didn't raise any expectations.

Working with new equipment

The saying goes: 'Never bring a knife to a gunfight' and such is the principle if you want to compete in a technical tournament. 
We have the very experienced Thai archers and a team of Chinese archers from Chengdu competing this year.
The Singaporeans who took part were no threat as they were very new to the sport. I transited from traditional archery to barebow by procuring a Spigarelli Revolution 25 Barebow riser. 
Took me about three months to get familiar with the new gear and truth to be told, the barebow riser is not as forgiving as my Hoyt Satori traditional hunting bow. And in such a technical tournament, the archer who has an Olympic recurve bow shooting background would have a great advantage.

Samo's Spigarelli Revo 25 Barebow Riser

Having a go with the Spiga Revo 25 at a range in Bangkok...

During training, my average score per round was at 200-220. There were bad days when I shot at 150/300. To shoot well with a barebow where an arrow rest and a bergen button is allowed, you have to master your shooting form. If you have bad form, the arrows will fly everywhere.
Since I shoot with a split-finger style, my aiming method is rather unique. On a good day, the arrow will land on where I look, usually on the yellow ring in a 40-cm, 10-ring target face. And at a distance of 18-meters, it's a daily challenge to be consistent. 
All that said and done, we planned our trip in such a way that we have a day's head-start before accreditation and the event's official practice...

The logistics

I picked a hotel in Bang Kapi, which is rather near to the Suvarnabhumi airport in Bangkok. The distance from the hotel to U-convention center is roughly about 4.6km. This means we don't have to rush at all during the qualifying rounds.
All we need to do is to pack our lunch from the hotel.
Michelle had booked the flight to Bangkok on a weekend which is Saturday. Official practice and athlete's accreditation is on Sunday.
This means we have a full day in Bangkok where we can shoot at a local archery range. The place in mind was Archery Thai near the outskirts of the city.
I have scoped the hotel in Bang Kapi, we picked a tourist hotel at Lat Phrao Road near the Ramkamheng University.
This is an interesting place with a choice of really good local food. Our primary aim is to experience the Indoor Barebow Championship, the secondary task was a honeymoon to celebrate 13 years of marriage...